Barge Gallery

GLC-LFB Fire boat - Fire Hawk

Entering service in February 1976, the Fire Hawk was built by Watercraft of Shoreham at a cost of £60, 000. Measuring 45 feet in length, 13.5 inch beam and with a 3.5 foot draft, she had a top speed of 17 knots. With a single fixed monitor forward, the twin portable pumps provided a pumping capacity of 1200 gpm (5400 litres per minute). The Fire Hawk was sold off in 2000

© London Fire Brigade / Mary Evans Picture Library

Manchester Ship Canal, 19th century

Manchester Ship Canal, 19th-century artwork. This canal, constructed between 1887 and 1893, opened on 1 January 1894. It provided a route for shipping from the Mersey Estuary to Manchester, UK, covering a distance of some 58 kilometres. Here, a steam-powered boat is approaching a railway bridge. Artwork from the 13th volume (first period of 1894) of the French popular science weekly La Science Illustree

© SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

Barges in the Pool of London. River Thames and Tower Bridge, London, 1962. Artist: CM Dixon

Barges in the Pool of London. River Thames and Tower Bridge, London, 1962. Part of the Tideway of the Thames, the Pool of London was navigable by tall-masted vessels bringing coastal and later overseas goods. Of vital importance to London for centuries, the river was lined with nearly continuous walls of wharves running for miles along both banks, and hundreds of ships moored in the river

© CM Dixon / Heritage-Images